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THE 



yPARIS COMMUNE. 



b- 



BY W. J. LINTON. 



In jlnswer to the Galurnnies of the JTew Tork Qj-icvjn 



■ i BOSTON: 
Reprinied from The Radical for September. 
1871. 



^L/MfittLtmrnmammtmii; 




'■'■The Tribune aims to be pre-eminently a Newspaper, . . . ct journal 
which has 710 steperior in the accuracy, variety, and freshness of its 
contents.'''' 

Tribune Advertisement. 

'■'■Newspapers are not licensed defamersP 

Tribune Editor. 



Yoti have loaded your columns with infavious rumors and malignant 
insinuations ; you have vented charges for which even your own garbled 
and partial reports gave not so much as a pretense of justification. 

W. J. L. — ■ Letter to Mr. Whitelaw Reid. 




THE PARIS COMMUNE. 



THE PARIS COMMUTE : its history and meaning. 
To begin, I take the story of "The New-York Tribune :" 
abridging, but nowhere altering, "The Tribune's" reports. In 
the accompanying notes I make such additions and corrections 
as I find fairly authenticated in the various Paris journals of the 
same dates. 

Paris, March 9, 1871. The Committee of the Bordeaux As- 
sembly reports in favor of removing to Fontainebleau. Thiers 
persists in preferring Versailles. 

March 10. A private dispatch from Paris states .that the 
National Guards are strongly intrenched in Montmartre, with 
thirty-three guns, awaiting the signal of their leaders to pro- 
claim open revolution in favor of the Commune ; also threaten- 
ing to dissolve the Assembly if it meets at Versailles. The 
Government is conciliatory. 

March 14. The insurgents have given in. 

March 16; They are scattering on account of the weather. 

March 17. The situation is unchanged. No acts of violence 
have been committed. After a council of war, Thiers issues a 
proclamation, and at midnight sends troops and gendarmes to 
surprise the insurgents, to take the thirty cannon, and to occupy 




4 TJie Paris Coimimnc. 

Montmartre. A number of cannon are removed and four hun- 
dred prisoners taken. Next morning — 

Saturday, March i8. The National Guards of Belleville and 
Montmartre, with many unarmed soldiers of the line, release 
the prisoners. Gen. Vinoy's cordon of troops and mitrailleuses, 
commanding the approaches to Montmartre, is invaded by angry 
groups of citizens, who remonstrate with the soldiers, and a 
general fraternization takes place. The soldiers on the summit 
also fraternize with the Nationals, who are still guarding some 
of the cannon. As fresh troops arrive the people order them to 
" reverse arms," and are obeyed. At ten, a.m., the Nationals 
again hold the ground. In the Place Pigalle, at the end of a 
street leading to the heights, some artillerymen and chasseurs 
are surrounded by a mob taunting them with cries of, " Go and 
fight the Prussians ! " A lieutenant, endeavoring to disengage 
himself, draws his sabre, and is dragged from his horse and 
killed. In the melee one artilleryman and two Nationals are 
wounded. The soldiers mingle with the crowd, distributing 
among them their cartridges and chassepots. Only the gen- 
darmes remain faithful to the Government. They are too few 
to be effective, and are withdrawn. At eleven, a.m , not a sol- 
dier nor a gendarme is visible. At Lavalette also the troops 
fraternize, whole regiments surrendering their arms and refusing 
to act against the insurgents. The purposes of the insurgents 
are still indefinite. Their main object just now is resistance to 
the Government. The crowds at Belleville and Montmartre are 
unanimous in their clamors against the Bordeaux Assembly. 
They demand its immediate dissolution, and the election of a 
new body which shall sit in Paris. 

Further on the same report says that Gen. Faron was for 
several hours surrounded by the mob ; but his troops proved 
faithful, took three barricades with the bayonet, and cut their 
way out. Gen. Paturel was wounded. Gen. Vinoy was hissed 
and pelted ; also was shot. Gens. Lecomte and Thomas, aban- 
doned by their men, were taken prisoners. Lecomte was killed, 
and Thomas taken before a drum-head court-martial and shot. 
Gen. " Paladines " was taken prisoner to the rebel headquarters. 
Many gendarmes were killed. The horse of a staff-officer was 




The Paris Commune. 



5 



killed, cut up, and eaten. The troops succeeded in capturing 
forty cannon, and the people retook five without fighting. The 
remainder were removed to a place of safety. Gen. Vinoy's 
staff, all troops of the line, and the entire force of gendarmes, 
returned to the left bank of the Seine, leaving the Natio7ial 
Gtiards to restore order on the right. 

After the morning's failure, Thiers issues another proclama- 
tion, repudiating any intention of a coup d'etat, warning the 
Comimmists who seek to pillage Paris XhSK. they will ruin France, 
and appealing to the National Guards to put an end to the anar- 
chy into which they have plunged the Capital.* 

(The above is in the very words — only abridged — of " The 
Tribune's " correspondent, and contains the whole story of 
March i8 as given in "The Tribune" of Monday, March 20.) 

The latest news (from London) is that the Nationals of Mont- 
martre have seized the headquarters of the National Guards of 
Paris.f 

March 21. The situation unchanged. Fresh barricades, but 
general quietude. Omnibuses not running, and traffic ceased. 
The Nationals occupy forts Issy, Vanvres, and Bicetre. The 
Police Commissioners are arrested. The Central Committee, 
in its official journal of the 20th, publishes the following: ''A 
manifesto, originating in the suffrages of two hundred and fifteen 
battalions of the National Guard, repudiates disturbance. The 
Government calumniates Paris and arms the Provinces. It 
imposes upon us a commander, attempts night disarmings, 
removes the capital. . . . The Nationals have participated in 
no crime." The journal also orders elections on the 22d, and 
announces that the Committee will abdicate on the election of 



* He himself cuts off telegraphic communication between Paris and the 
Provinces, and boasts in his proclamation of Vinoy's forty thousand men. 
He writes to the Prefects of Departments that the generals are returning 
from Germany, and that Canrobert has offered his sword, — Canrobert, who, 
on the 2d of December, grape-shotted women and children in Montmartre. 
For "the anarchy" take this, from La Commune, Paris, March 21 : "Yes- 
terday (Monday) the Exchange opened as usual, in spite of orders sent 
expressly from Versailles." 

I Implying that the revolt is only of a section of Paris, — the woi^king- 
men's districts of Belleville and Montmartre. 




6 The Pai'is Commune. 

a new one. It declares its respect for the preliminaries of 
peace, and invites adhesions from the Departments. It repu- 
diates all participation in the execution of Gens. Lecomte and 
Thomas.* 

The Nationals "completely possess the whole city." Gen. 
Clancy is maltreated by the mob ; sent to the hospital ; confined 
in prison ; released by the Committee. Many persons are shot 
without trial. " The Nationals will shoot M. Thiers and Gens. 
Vinoy and D'Aurelles^if they should be captured." Strong 
reaction among the respectable inhabitants. The Central Com- 
mittee, alarme'd thereat, seeks the mediation of " the Mayor of 
the city" for the appointment of Admiral Saisset to the com- 
mand of the National Guard. f The insurgent journals declare 
a willingness to treat with the Versailles Government on the fol- 
lowing conditions : " The election of a Communal Council \ by 
the peofle of Paris ; reorga7iization of the National Giiard, with 
power to elect and remove their own officers ; and stippression of 
the Prefecture of Police. § The " army journals " declare Thiers 
the author of the trouble. The editors of the Paris journals 
oppose the ordered elections, and call upon the National Guard 
to come forward and put an end to the deplorable state of 
affairs. || The Versailles Government addresses a circular to 
the Prefects of Departments, informing them that the revolu- 
tion, dishonored by its criminal acts, is unanimously disavowed ; 
that the Assembly also disavows it.^ The Mayors of Paris — 

* L'Opinion National says that Lecomte was shot by his own sol- 
diers, whom he had threatened to shoot for fraternizing with the National 
Guards. A Versailles paper mentions a corporal of the Eighty-eighth Regi- 
ment. 

•j- There is no "Maj^or of the city." Saisset was so unpopular that not 
a battalion would follow him. It was he who, in the Assembly, spoke for 
calhng on the Provinces to march against Paris, "and so have done with it." 

X So in The Tribune, for all the editor's after-ignorance of anything 
except " Communism." 

§ The Imperial Prefecture. 

II " Two hundred and fifteen " battalions — out of two hundred and sixty- 
five — having already come forward /"or the Commune. 

^ Saying nothing of the protests of the Representatives of Paris. Alto- 
gether a most disingenuous and lying circular. 




The Paris Comnmne. y 

the circular also says — protest and refuse to carry out the ille- 
gal orders for the Communal elections ; and the Nationals only 
demand the nomination of Saisset. The Government promises 
the speedy intervention of the army. 

March 22. A large number of unarmed persons attempt to 
pass the lines guarded by the Nationals. Refused passage, and, 
"retreating too slowly," three ranks of the Nationals filed out 
and fired, killing or wounding thirty persons. "The Nationals 
have since been re-enforced, and are orderly."* The Nationals, 
under the order of " the Central Republican Committee," occupy 
Fort Vincennes unopposed, the garrison fraternizing. Gen. Clu- 
seret has installed himself at the Ministry of War.f The Bourse 
is deserted. Reported that Gen. Raphael has been assassi- 
nated. 

March 24. Elections postponed. The commander of the 
insurgent Nationals justifies "the massacre" on the 22d, on the 
ground that the opposite party fired first. Rumored that Gen. 
Ducrot has been shot by his own soldiers. Admiral Saisset 
appointed commander of the orderly Nationals, The insurgent 
leaders losing control of their troops. 

MARCHi26. The Central Committee, the Paris Deputies to 
the Assembly, and the Mayors and the Assistant Mayors of 
Arrondissements yesterday joined in a proclamation ordering 
elections for to-day, tirgmg all classes to vote, and to give the 
vote a serious character, such as alone can insure the peace of 
the city. I The voting has passed off without disorder, and the 

* In the first instance, some one hundred and fifty men, with drum and 
cries of, " Down with the Commune ! " parade the streets. These go unno- 
ticed. Later, shots are fired ; first by " the unarmed " demonstrants. 
Three Nationals were killed, and a dozen of " the party of order," who pro- 
voked and began the affray. 

t The only committee as yet is " the Central Committee " of the National 
Guard, which has no " Ministry of War." Cluseret arrived in Paris on the 
25th of March, and was appointed by the Communal Council on the 4th of 
April, 

X The elections had been put off on account of the hesitation of some of 
the Mayors to co-operate with the Central Committee. In the Mot d'Ordre 
Rochefort says that the Committee invited them to take their place at the 
Hotel de Ville even so early as the night of the 19th ; but they waited word 




8 ■ The Paris Connmine. 

city is tranquil.* The list of candidates endorsed by the Cen- 
tral Committee has been extensively distributed.! In the first 

from Versailles. Afterward, with few exceptions, they joined in the procla- 
mation (that referred to by The Tribune) here following : — 

FRENCH REPUBLIC. 
Liberty — Equality — Fraternity. 

The Central Committee of the National Guard, to which have rallied the Deputies of 
Paris, the Mayors and Adjoints, convinced that the sole means to avoid civil war, the effu- 
sion of blood in Paris, and at the same time to consolidate [affermir] the Republic, is to 
proceed to immediate elections, convotes for to-morrow (Sunday) all the citizens in their 
electoral colleges. 

The inhabitants of Paris will comprehend that under present circumstances patriotism 
obliges them all to come to vote, to the end that the elections may have that serious charac- 
ter which alone can assure peace to the city. 

The bureaux will be open at eight in the morning and closed at midnight. 

Vive la Republique! 

Undersigned are the names of the Mayors and Assistant Mayors of sev- 
enteen arrondissements ; the Representatives of the Seine present in Paris, 
— Lockroy, Floquet, Tolain, Clemen(;eati^ Schoelcher, Greppoj and the Cen- 
tral Committee, — Avoi7te, Arnatid, Arnold, Assz, Andignoux, Bouii, Ber- 
geret, Babick, Barond, BilHoray, Blanchet, Castioni, Chouteau, Diipont, Fer- 
rat, Fortune, Fabre, Fleury, Fougeret, Gaudier, Gouhier, Guiral, Geresme, 
Grollard, Josselin, Jottrde, Lisbonne, Lavalette, Lullier, Maljournal, Mo- 
rcati, Mortier, Prtidhomi7te, Rousseau, Ranvier, Varlin, Viard. 

* A warm sun, an azure sky, promenaders everywhere, in all the streets 
fresh toilets of women, cafes overflowing with customers, shops dressed out 
with their gayest wares, people going here and there on business across the 
crowd, groups in which calmness replaced the animation of the past week : 
such, traced in broad outlines, has been the general physiognomy of the day 
of voting. 

• The elections have been conducted quietly and in good order, but the 
interest (empressement) of the electors has not been very great; some- 
times intermittences of a quarter of an hour between the ballots. Lively 
discussions between the citizens, some wanting to abstain, others consider- 
ing silence as a crime. They talk, they grow warm, and that is all. — Le 
Petit Journal, Paris, March 28. 

•j- There was no such list. The Committee distinctly refused to nominate 
or recommend any candidates. The election was absolutely free. Here is 
the list of the elected, in the order of the twenty arrondissements of Paris, 
as given in Le Petit Journal corrected by Le Moniteur du Peuple ; perhaps 
not quite correct now : — 

I. Meline, Adatn, Rochart, Barre. 2. Bi'elay, Loiseau Pinson, Tirard, 
Cheron. 3. Demay, Arnaud, Pindy, Murat, Ainouroux. 4. Arnould, 
Amourotix, Clemence, Gerardiit, Lefrangais. 5. Regere, Jourde, Tridon, 




The Paris Commime. 9 

arrondissement the present Mayor and Assistant-Mayor were 
candidates ; other arrondissements made similar nominations.* 
In a proclamation just issued the Central Republican Commit- 
tee! resigns its functions and yields to the newly elected Muni- 
cipal Government. Barricades still are in the streets, but the 
cannon are turned inward. Shops open. Cabs running. The 
confidence of the people is reviving. Gens. Clancy and " Lan- 
goureau" are released. Menotti Garibaldi is appointed com- 
mander-in-chief J Admiral Saisset called yesterday on all loyal 
citizens and soldiers to rally round him. To-day he disbands 
the loyal National Guards. § 

March 27. The candidates of the Central Republican Com- 
mittee have been elected in all the arrondissements except three. 
The aggregate vote was very light. The "Journal de Paris " esti- 
mates the number of qualified voters who abstained from voting 
at two hundred and fifty thousand: In the second arrondisse- 
ment, with twenty-two thousand eight hundred and fifty-three 
registered electors, twenty-one thousand one hundred and eigh- 
ty votes were cast, seventeen thousand one hundred and eighty 
of these against the Committee. " The Daily News " (London), 
of same date, reports that " the elections passed off qtiietly, and 
resulted in an overwelming Communist majority." 

Later reports (in next day's "Tribune") : It is expected that 

Blanchet, Ledroit. 6. Leroy., Goupil, Varlin, Beslay, Robinet. 7. Pari- 
sel, Lefevre, Urbain, Brunei, Libeaiicourt. 8. Raoul-Rigault, Arnould, 
Vaillant, Allix. 9. Ratic, Desmarest, Parent, Ferry. 10. Pyat, Fortune, 
Gmnbon, Champy, Babick. ii. Mortier, Delesduze, Elides, Verdure, 
Pretot, Assi. 12. Varlin, Theits, Fruneau, Geresme. 13. Meillet, Char- 
do?i, Frandel, Dtival. 14. Billioray, Martelet, Descamps. 15. Parisel, 
Lefevre, Urbain, Brunei. 16. Marmottan, De Bouteiller, Victor Hugo, 
Pyat. 17. Varlin, E. Clement, Gerardin, Chalain. 18. Blanqui, Dereure, 
Ferre, Theisz, Vermorel, J. B. Clement, Grousset. 19. Oudet, Puget, Deles- 
cluze, Ostyti. 20. Ranvier, Bergeret, Blanqtd, Flourens. 

The names in small capitals are of members of the Central Commit- 
tee. 

* Nominated and elected. 

t The Central Committee (of the National Guard) again. 

% Not one of the Garibaldis — father or sons — had any part in the move- 
ment, or was in Paris during the Commune. 

§ Some three hundred out of two hundred thousand. 



W". 




lO The Paris Comnmne. 

M. Blanqui will be President of the new government* Of five 
hundred thousand electors only tzvo Juindred thousand voted for 
the Comimme. Twenty members of the Committee elected. 
The conservatives successful only in the three wealthiest arron- 
dissements. The rich generally abstained from voting, and 
the merchants voted the conservative ticket. The elected are 
mostly obscure men. The official journal says that " the first 
task of the newly elected Municipality of Paris will be the com- 
pilation of a charter that will secure the rights of the people, 
and prevent the representation of the large towns from being 
swamped by the country, . , , Matters essentially Parisian must 
be within the domain of the Commune." 

March 29. The Commune was proclaimed yesterday after- 
noon at the Hotel de Ville, an enormous crowd of National 
Guards zealously cheering the Republic.f A Sub-central Com- 
mittee has replaced the old Central Committee.^ Currently 
reported that a division has occurred in the Committee. Sev- 
eral members under arrest. Also one condemned to death as a 
Bonapartist. The Bank of France has again advanced five hun- 
dred thousand francs to the insurgents (one million before). 
The Postal Director refuses to give up his functions. § Paris 
quiet. The red flag generally displayed. Menotti and Ric- 
ciotti Garibaldi have declined to fight except against a for- 
eign enemy. 

March 30. The Sub-central Committee passed sentence of 
death upon "Wilfred" Fonvielle for being engaged in an at- 

* The Communal Council had no President. Blanqui, held in prison by 
the Thiers Government, for the affair of Oct. 31, was never in Paris during 
the Commune. 

t The Commune of Paris is proclaimed. The members who compose it 
were yesterday acclaimed, in the Place of the Hotel de Ville, by two hun- 
dred thousand armed National Guards. At the hour in which we write the 
Central Committee has laid down its power, &c. Speeches by Assi and 
Lavalette. — La Nouvelle Republique, March 30. 

\ No such committee. The Central Committee returned to its original 
functions as Committee of the National Guard. Only some of its members 
were also members of the new Communal Council. 

§ But deranged everything by going to Versailles, where Paris letters 
were detained and opened. 




TJie Paris Commune. 1 1 

tempt against the existence of the Committee. * Also an 
Executive Committee has been appointed by the Sub-central. 
It will have charge of affairs for a month. M. Blanqui is in 
hiding, and has not yet been present at any of the meetings 
at the Hotel de Ville.f It is stated that M. Delescluze has, in 
consequence of a declaration on the part of his colleagues that 
the position was incompatible with his dignity, resigned the 
membership of the Communal Committee to which he was 
chosen at the election of Sunday.^ The Communists still dis- 
agree among themselves as to their future movements. The 
monthly salary of the Communist Councilors is fixed at three 
hundred francs. § 

March 31. " The Government has completed arrangements 
for moving against Paris. Learning this, the Commune have 
resolved to march upon Versailles." 

ANOTHER REIGN OF TERROR THREATENED. 

STARTLING DECREES ISSUED BY THE COMMITTEE — EVERY ABLE-BODIED 
MAN MUST FIGHT — THE PAYMENT OF RENTS SUSPENDED — PROPOSED 
SALE OF THE GOVERNMENT PALACES — THE GUILLOTINE TO BE ESTAB- 
LISHED AGAIN. 

Under the above caption : A decree was made public abolish- 
ing the conscription, stating that no force except the National 
Guards will be introduced into Paris, and ordering that all able- 
bodied male citizens shall belong to the National Guard. An- 
other decree remits lodgers' rents from October, 1870, to April, 
1 87 1, and says the rents to be paid shall be reckoned by months. 
The sale of all pawned articles is suspended. || Another decree 

* No such committee. "Wilfred" perhaps means Ulric, the general, who ' 
was raising, troops in the Provinces. On the strength of this, to-day's 
reports in The Tribune are headed: '•'■ Arbitrary measures of the Central 
Cotnniittee — Its opponents to be shot — One already co7idenined to death." 

f Why should " the President " be in hiding ? Blanqui, who was not in 
Paris. 

X He resigned his seat in the Versailles Assembly. 

§ Not quite seventeen dollars a week. Tell it not in Washington. These 
men were " pillagers." 

II The preamble of these decrees : " Considering that labor, industry, and 
commerce have borne all the charges of the war, that it is just that property 
should bear its share of sacrifices for the country," &c. 




12 The Paris Commune. 

orders all public officials, on pain of dismissal, to disregard 
orders from Versailles.* Versailles documents are forbidden 
circulation. Paris grows sadder daily. One hundred and sixty 
thousand people have left the city in the last ten days. Chap- 
lains are ordered to cease the performance of mass in the pris- 
ons. The insurance offices are searched for jewels and money 
of the Empress. The Communal Council holds its deliberations 
in private, but the following information has been divulged : An 
Executive Committee of seven members has been appointed ; the 
Commune is divided into nine sections, — Finance, War, Justice, 
Safety, Subsistence, Education, Labor, Foreign, and Municipal.! 
The Communal Council is deliberating upon a proposal to pay 
the Prussian indemnity by the sale of Versailles, St. Cloud, and 
Fontainebleau. The evening edition of '* The Times " (London) 
contains a letter saying that " measures of proscription were 
secretly enforced everywhere, and the significant word 'guil- 
lotine,' though spoken only in whispers, is in everybody's 
mouth."! 

After this date it is war. 

April 2. A movement is in progress to disarm and disband 
all battalions of Nationals which do not recognize the authority 
of the Commune. § The National Guards as a body recognize 
the Commune. The party of order still hold possession of the 
Bank of France, which, however, " to save itself from being 
plundered," has advanced six milhon francs to the insurgents. 

* Not unnecessary, when the Postmaster-General had gone off to Ver- 
sailles, and when the officials, under Versailles orders, had already disor- 
ganized the service of the octroi, the registration, public assistance, and 
marine, and had threatened to stop the gas. The reorganization by the 
Commune seems to have been good, economical and effective. 

t The Paris journals give the organization of the Communal Council 
as follows ; Executive, War, Justice, General Surety, Subsistence, Laboi 
(Industry and Exchange), External Relations, Public Services, Edtication. 

X Which reported letter is the only warrant for The Tribune editor's ma 
licious caption, — "ANOTHER REIGN OF TERROR THREAT- 
ENED — THE GUILLOTINE TO BE ESTABLISHED AGAIN." 

§ On the contrary, the Paris journals complain of the insufficient armin 
of the National Guards, and the Communal Council appeals to the patriotisn 
of citizens to supply the want by bringing their spare muskets for the uS' 
of those who have none. 



■ 



The Pmis Commune. 13 

April 6. A proclamation announces retaliatory measures. 

April 7. Fearful slaughter on both sides, yesterday and 
to-day. Terror reigns. The prisoizs are crowded. The chwxhes 
mid houses of the aristocrats are pillaged, and all priests impris- 
oned. A great many murders have taken place.* 

April ii. New efforts for conciliation are making in Paris, 
eighteen members of the Commune having declared themselves 
disposed to treat with the Versailles Government. The Com- 
mune hourly grows more desperate, and resorts to fierce excesses. 

" The conciergerie is filled with priests and nuns who have 
been arrested on warrants calling them ' citizens styled the ser- 
vants of a person called God.' Archbishop Darboy was stripped 
naked, bound to a pillar, and scourged and mocked for hours by 
a band of two hundred Reds," f 

April ii, MIDNIGHT. The insurgents are said to have 
made a demand upon the Church for one million francs, and 
avow that they will kill the Archbishop if it is not paid.J 

* Turning to the Paris journals, for and against the Commune, of these 
first days of April, when " terror reigned," &c., I find : Only one murder 
has been committed in Paris during two months. Palm Sunday-(April 2) 
celebrated in "all the churches " of Paris. "An inhabitant of the quarter" 
tells in one of the journals of the " demenagement k la Prussienne," by two 
hundred National Guards, of the house of the Prince de Wagram. I find 
no more outrages of these " Communists " ifi Paris; but outside they tell 
of eight Nati'onals taken prisoners by the Versaillists, who tie one to a 
horse's tail, and rip up (eventrer) another. And a girl's school, coming out 
of the church of Neuilly, is cut to pieces, hashed, by the Thiers grape-shot 
( " litteralement hackee par la mitraille "). 

Instead of " the churches are pillaged, and all priests imprisoned," read 
this : The Communal Council decrees the separation of Church and State* 
for Paris ; suppresses the State allowance (budget des cultes) ; and declares 
the "biens dit de mortmain" and other church effects to be national prop- 
erty, appointing an inquest concerning the sajne. 

t No doubt the same two hundred Reds who "prussianised" the house of 
the Prince de Wagram a week ago. The story is worthy of the known 
inventive powers of the historian Thiers, good for rousing the Breton and 
Vendean peasantry, but not believed even by a Tribune editor. 

X One million francs, having already pillaged and taken all they could lay 
their hands on ; and the priests, too, all in prison ! An outrageous demand ! 
These be "desperate" and "fierce excesses," in good sooth. And at mid- 
nig-ht ! 





14 TJie Paris Commwie. 

April 12. The cur6 of the Church of Madeleine is reported 
to have been assassinated by a Parisian mob. 

April 13. The delegates proposing conciliation return. M. 
Thiers issues another circular calling them Communists and 
assassins. Resignations from the Commune continue, 

April 14. The Comniunists* are plundering the public of- 
fices of their papers and their plate.f The latter is sent to the 
mint. The churches are carefully searched, J and all valuables 
seized to be converted into coin. Notwithstanding all Com- 
iminist precautions, five hundred thousand people have left 
since the troubles began. § 

April 16. The state carriages of Prince Murat and Marshal 
Canrobert have been seized by the Commune officials. A dele- 
gate of the Commune has taken an inventory of the objects of 
value in the mostfashiojiable churches. || The Central Commit- 
tee are still at variance with the Commune. ^ 

April 20. A Commune manifesto says, Paris does not aim 
at dictatorship. She desires the decentralized unity of the cou7i- 
try. "The London Telegraph" says, The Arc de Triomphe 
has been destroyed by the fire of the Versaillists. The " Mot 
d'Ordre" condemns the Commune for its suppression of various 
journals. 

April 21. Another revolution is imminent. The Commune 
has arrested the Central Committee. Complete anarchy reigns, 

April 23. Last evening the cash-box of the Parisian Gas 

* Notice how adroitly the ingenuous editor changes the Cojnmunal Council 
to the Comimuiists. " For ways that are dark," &c. 

t Their " plate." What plate in public offices ? 

X To be sure that nothing was left by the first pillagers. 

§ The troubles began on the i8th of March, twenty-five days ago. An 
exodus of twenty thousand persons daily, notwithstanding Comnnmist pre- 
cautions. It was one hundred and sixty thousand in ten weeks, before. It 
is well to certify the exactness of our correspondents. 

II The churches are pillaged on the 7th. On the 14th they carefully search 
them, and seize the remaining valuables. On the i6th they make an inven- 
tory of what is left. These are pillagers. And beside the treble pillage of 
the churches, having, let us say, gutted one house, they do seize two state 
carriages. A most Communistic and pillaging Communal Council, forsooth ! 

If Or Communal Council ? The editor keeps the words well mixed, for 
the more confusion. 




ttMaiM 



The Paris Commune. 



15 



Company was opened by National Guards, and seven thousand 
francs abstracted. The money has been returned to the Gas 
Company. The Montmartre battalions are mutinous. A dele-, 
gation of Freemasons has gone to Versailles to ask an armis- 
tice, to allow the inhabitants of the bombarded villages to leave. 
■ April 24. Thiers refuses the armistice. The Commune 
apologizes to the Gas Company. The churches of St. Roch 
and St. Sulpice have been reopened, and their cur6s released 
from imprisonment. 

April 25. Gen. Cluseret and the Central Committee are 
quarreling. Thiers admitted to the Freemasons his intention 
to bombard Paris as soon as he had all the forts. He consents 
to an armistice without recognizing the Commune. A placard 
on the walls of Paris invites " friends of order " to be in readi- 
ness to avenge their brethren murdered in the recent butchery 
in the Place Vendome.* 

April 30. A Masonic procession, half a mile in length, 
passed through the streets to-day, and planted their banners on 
the ramparts under a heavy fire. All the Paris lodges were rep- 
resented. At a sitting of the Commune, M. Grousset repelled 
the charge of. reproachable warfare. The use of explosive bul- 
lets and the bombarding of wome7t and children was confuted to 
the Versaillists. In the cartridge-boxes of prisoners explosive 
bullets had been found, and the wanton shelling of the most 
crowded parts of the city had been going on for weeks. 

May 2. The Commune has appointed a Committee of Pub- 
lic Safety. 

May 3. The Column in the Place Vendome and all statues 
and vestiges of monarchy are to be destroyed.! 

* See the first note on page eighty-five. 

t " The Commune of Paris — 

" Considering that the imperial column on the Place Vendome is a monu- 
ment of barbarism, a symbol of brute force and false glory, an afiirmation of 
niilitaryism, a denial of international right, a permanent insult from the con- 
querors to the conquered, a perpetual criminal attempt [attentat] against 
one of the three great principles of the French RepubHc, Fraternity- — 
"Decrees, — 

'^ One single Article : The Column of the Place Vendome shall be demolished. 

"Paris, April 12, 1871." 




1 6 The Paris Commune. 

May 7. Five priests arrested on the charge of being spies. 
The church of St. Eustache converted into a political club- 
room ; that of " St. German I'Auperrois " used for public meet- 
ings and concerts ; and the Tuileries as an asylum for the wid- 
ows and orphans of National Guards killed in the struggle. A 
decree orders the restoration of pledges under the value of five 
francs. 

May 8. A concert at the Tuileries in aid of the wounded : 
twelve thousand francs collected. 

May 10. The " Sub-committee of Organization," in a procla- 
mation issued to-day, orders the troops not to cease firing on 
the Versaillists %vho may attempt to surrender ; while fugitives 
and stragglers are to be sabred when caught, or, if in numerous 
bodies, fired into mercilessly with cannon and mitrailleuses.* 

May II. The demolition decreed of the house of M, Thiers, 
in consequence of his proclamation. 

May 16. The Vendome Column thrown down. 

May 19. A ''Court of Impeacliment'' opened to-day to select 
hostages on whom to retaliate. Many eminent citizens daily 
imprisoned.^ The sacred articles in the Church of the Trinity 
seized. All the churches to be similarly dealt with.l and then 
closed. The demolition of the Chapel of the Expiation § begun. 

May 24. Paris in flames. The Louvre completely gutted. 
Fires raging in nearly every street. The Versaillists fiercely 
bombarding. The dead unburied. The wounded lying un- 
tended in the streets. 

May 25. Archbishop Darboy, ten hostages, and nearly fifty 
priests, murdered in cold blood at the Mazas Prison on Tuesday 
night. II The fires are nearly all extinguished. It is believed 
that in many cases they were caused by the shells of the Ver- 

* I have not found elsewhere any mention either of the Committee or the 
proclamation., 

\ These eminent citizens not having escaped among the five hundred 
thousand who fled from Paris. 

X What ! pillaging them yet again ? 

§ Erected in memory of the martyred Louis XVI. Not yet demoHshed. 

II This is the first account given. Probably the exact number will never 
be known, nor by whose order they perished. The "cold blood" is 
remarkable. ~^ 



The Paris Commune. 



IT 



saillists, and not by the Communists. Last night and to-day 
the Government troops refused to give quarter, and killed all 
who fell into their hands. The Insurgents are dealing destruc- 
tion and death. The Versaillists " are not savage, but exhibit 
a childish delight." 

May 28. It is calculated that there are upward of fifty thou- 
sand dead bodies in the houses and cellars of Paris, many of 
women and children. Since Sunday* thirty thousand prison- 
ers have been taken, "including numbers of debauched and 
foul-mouthed women." 

So far I have taken the story of the Paris Commune from an 
enemy's pen. I have suppressed nothing, softened nothing, 
extenuated nothing, excused nothing, explained onW where the 
explanation was beyond doubt, contradicted only with fair 
authority. Such tales as eating a chasseur's horse and scourg- 
ing the naked Archbishop may be left with the "deaths" of 
men still alive, — uncojmmented upon. Other statements I 
leave unnoticed, not recognizing their truth, but being without 
present means for refuting or verifying them : often finding no 
mention of them save in the correspondence of "The Tribune." 
Let the story, with the exceptions noted, stand in "The Tri- 
bune " words, with some amount of mendacity still unaccounted 
for. Even so the accuser can find no warrant for " The Tri- 
bune's" foul-mouthed editorials. Where is the ground for the 
slanders of MM. Thiers and Favre, and all that pack of unprin- 
cipled "journalists" which has followed yelping at their heels.? 
Two hundred thousand National Guards are neither pillagers 
nor assassins. The leaders of these " pillagers " gave them- 
selves less than seventeen dollars a week as governors of Paris, 
and left exact, accounts of all the monies which Xh&y pillaged. 
Save that one massacre (if you will) of " the hostages," an act 
of desperation which is not brought home to the Communal 
Council (and how many were not harmed t we are told that 
"the prisons were crowded"), no deed of blood disgraced the 
Parisians. In this " City of Assassins," during two months, up 
to the 4th of April, only one murder was committed in Paris, 

* The report is dated Sunday (" May 28 "). 



wmmmmm 



HMMaHVMN 




1 8 ' The Paris Commune. 

that for the sake of theft, by one of Thiers^ Breton Mobiles. 
Under this " Reign of Terror," to the same date, until Paris 
was actually besieged, while M. Thiers was writing to the Pre- 
fects that " the Commune is pillaging," " held in horror by the 
Parisians, who wait impatiently for the moment of their deliver- 
ance," people went to and fro, in and out of the city, and 
appeals were made to citizens not to keep more than one 
musket while their fellow-citizens were unarmed. Where was 
the assassination ? The slain and condemned men are yet 
alive. And the pillage is — the lie of the historical liar, 
Thiers, re-uttered by a knavish fool in " The Tribune," who 
tells us that they inventoried the church valuables after the 
churches had been stripped, and refutes his own calumnies by 
inadvertently holding up the Communal Council of Paris as an 
example to New York.* Pillage ! They did not even pillage 
the house of M. Thiers. They destroyed the Vendome Col- 
umn, — not without giving reasons. Thiers did not spare the 
Arc de Triomphe, They fired public buildings, — by the right 
of war. " It is believed," says " The Tribune," " that in many 
cases the fires were caused by the shells of the Versaillists, and 
not by the Communists." By " the Communists," — it was the 
right of war. Were stone and mortar to be held more sacred 
than the lives of women and of children .-• If they fought with 
the fury of desperation, they were not brutal and cruel as their 
assailants were. On Thiers' head be the infamy — Napoleon 
out-Napoleoned — of raising an ignorantly fanatical army f to 

* The Paris Commune was one of the worst bodies that ever cursed a 
nation or a city. But before its inglorious term of power closed it explained 
in detail how it acquired five million dollars, and how it expended that sum 
during two months of its government. Our rulers for two years have not 
accounted for the money they received, nor explained how it was disbursed. 
— Tribune Editor, May 29. 

\ The returned Papal Zouaves, Cathelineau's Vendeans, Charrette's 
Chouans, Trochu's Bretons : the scum of all the ignorance and bigotry 
of the rural districts. The character of these levies may be inferred from 
one single fact: that //^^ Italian Government remonstrated, seeing in the 
very existence of such a force a threat of new intermeddhng with Rome. 
To these were joined the Imperial Guards, the picked tools of Napoleon. 
So was constituted the Army of the Party of Order, under the Imperialist 
General, MacMahon. 



,^M^^^.^^t^. \^.mm^^^X'^^^^}imm m^^ 




The Paris'* Comm7ine. 



19 



repeat in the name of "order" the outrages and excesses of 
the League, No such unpatriotic disgrate can slur the sorrow- 
ful epitaph of the Paris Commune. 

Were they Communists ? A Communist has the right to put 
his belief into action. Was the International Association at 
its head or at its back.? It matters little. The old Communist 
theories, though still perhaps held by a io.^ individuals, have 
never moved the masses; are not, since 1849, the dominant the- 
ories of even a sect in France. The International Association 
I cannot track either as instigator or abettor. Members of that 
wide-spread Association (whose worst reproach is its peaceful- 
ness) were among them. It could not be otherwise when the 
Communal party embraced not merely a knot of political enthu- 
siasts, but the whole working population of Paris, including also 
the smaller shopkeepers, — the whole of that class which lives 
by its own labor instead of by the exploitation of the labor of 
others. It was not only a revolt of Paris against an usurping 
Assembly : it zvas a revolt of labor against the age-long unscru- 
p7dous rapacity of power. For this, well understood by the 
party of Thiers and "order," it was so ruthlessly crushed out — 
if the massacre of only fifty thousand men, women, and chil- 
dren has crushed it out. Here is but the beginninq;. 



HOW THE COMMUNAL MOVEMENT BEGAN, AND W^HAT IT SOUGHT. 

It dates from Napoleon's capitulation at Sedan : when men 
thought they saw in the establishment of the Commune the 
only force which could resist the Prussians. Favre, Trochu, 
and others were proclaiming the impossibility of defense ; the 
defeated generals, to lessen their own shame, echoing the cry. 
Less cowardly, the Parisians, with yet some faith in the love of 
country, demanded the continuance of the war. The Commit- 
tee of Defense, aware of the feeling against them, attempted, 
as governments always do, to hinder the expression of public 
opinion. This burst out, however, on the 20th of September, 
in a manifesto, then first published, which demanded, — 

1. The suppression of the imperial police, or rather its trans- 
feral into the hands of the municipality. 

2, Equal subsistence accorded to all citizens and their fami- 




20 TJie Paris' Commune. 

lies during the siege, and after the siege the aboHtion of misery 
by some social organization of production. 

3. The levy en masse of all citizens, and forced requisition of 
whatever could be useful to the defense. 

4. Suppression, after the war, of standing armies, and organ- 
ization of the national militia. 

5. The absolute sovereignty of the Commune in all regarding 
its taxation, police, education, and legislation. 

This programme, identical with that proclaimed at the Hotel 
de Ville on March 18, could not suit the representatives of 
the principle of authority. It was discussed and combated 
by them ; but, as it gained popularity, they precipitated events, 
so that on the 31st of October an attempted Communal mani- 
festation was put down by the troops of the line and by the 
peasant mobiles brought by Trochu to defend the altar and the 
throne. Nevertheless, this manifestation proved the people's 
desire to defend themselves ; and from this day the Government 
was forced to allow them to arm, refused before on the ground 
that there were not arms enough. Paris from that time became 
an immense war-factory : cannon were cast, cartridges made, 
old muskets altered. At the moment of capitulation Paris was 
in its best condition for defense. But the Government feared 
the Prussians less than they feared the armed people. 

The capitulation filled Paris with consternation. And when 
it was learned that the Prussians would make a triumphal entry, 
the indignant feeling was so general that resistance, even in 
spite of the Government, was meditated. Two-thirds of the 
National Guard were of this mind, and Favre had to return to 
Bismarck to beg a modification of his programme. So some 
sort of compromise was come to. 

During this parley between the National Guards and the 
Government, the Guards had taken charge of certain cannon 
which, though not included in the terms of surrender, the Gov- 
ernment had carefully left in the way of the Prussians, as if will- 
ing to be rid of them. These the National Guards removed to 
Montmartre, and placed under the watch of all their battalions, 
turn by turn. 

Meanwhile, the first act of the newly elected Assembly, met 




mmM 



The Paris Conunune. 



21 



at Bordeaux, was to affront Paris by refusing to hear either 
Garibaldi* or Victor Hugo. Resenting this, convinced that the 
Assembly was royalist, and seeing themselves overruled by the 
rural districts, again the Commune came into men's minds as 
the fittest remedy. Still it was only an idea. What further 
provocation was needed was supplied by the decision to hold 
the Assembly out of Paris, and by the violent intentions of 
Thiers, — so plainly put forth in his speeches and proclamations, 
and attempted to be carried out by the night surprise on the 
1 7-1 8th of March, and the invasion of Paris on the i8th by the 
Government troops. In face of this bad faith and maladroit- 
ness, the men who had taken the initiative against the capitula- 
tion reappeared as* a Committee of the National Guard,! and 
appealed to the city to organize their municipal government, — 
the Paris Commune. 

The situation will be sufficiently explained by the following 
extracts from the Paris Communal journals. " La Commune," 
No. 2, March 21, says, — 

Paris is reproached witli sending ready-made governments to the peas- 
ants, — and it is the peasants who weigh down Paris with their empire, ple- 
biscitums, and deputies, who may perfectly satisfy their sottishness, but who 
have on us the effect of an exhumation of another age. We have been long 
enou"-h at their mercy. They have absolved December the 2d condemned 
by us, voted for the war which we repulsed, abandoned the country we would 
have defended, and now they would impose on us a king. 

"Le Crl du Peuple," March 25, says, — 

The programme of the revolution has been produced : Paris a free city, 
not separated from France, but not submitted to statesmen whom it pleases 
the Province to acclaim, to elect, or to suffer ; Paris freely governing itself 
through its Communal Council and civic and corporate organization, voting 
its own budget, sending its deputies to the National Assembly, — legislative 
or federal, — contributing its share for the charges of the country, furnishing 
in case of war a certain contingent of mobile national guards; Paris remain- 
ino- the industrial, commercial, economic, and intellectual capital, while ceas- 

* He was elected for seven places. 

\ They were men unknown to politics, obscure men, — their enemies say, — 
a reproach or a compliment ; and their influence appears due only to the 
popularity of their cause, and the fact of their initiative in the matter of 
opposing the capitulation. Some days later I find them sustained by a dele- 
gation from all the arrondissements of Paris. 




iilifcfl*IW"'' Hllii'lilPH^" 




22 The Paris Commune. 

ing to be the political capital of France. ... At once renovative and con- 
servative, in accord with the traditions of France. 

Such programmes of course bind no men. In all revolutions 
and parties there are some who think the programme too far- 
going, while in the minds of others it goes not far enough. 
Among the elder politicians, like Blanqui, some dreams of the 
old Communist Utopias might yet linger. But Communism — 
the having all things in common, abolition of property and fam- 
ily — nowhere appears, either in the words or acts, of Communal 
(not Communistic) Paris. Here I speak neither for nor against 
theories : I am only stating facts. The Communal idea of this 
last revolution, so far from being a carrying-out of the ideas of 
the revolutionists of '89 and '48 (Communistic or other), was 
indeed a retrogression, — an absolute going back to the days 
before " France " was. 

Look into Thierry's " Letters on the History of France." 
Read there the account of the Communes, in ancient Gaul, yet 
divided among kings and counts ever warring upon one another, 
a country without nationality, without unity, without govern- 
ment. Not rising, as in England, by grace of royal charter, 
but retaining, with certain modifications, the Roman franchises, 
.only availing themselves of royal pretense or alliance against 
too potent lord or bishop, these municipalities realized all the 
freedom possible in those days, were indeed cities of refuge for 
republican thought, fastnesses in which the worker and the 
trader found some safety from crowned and helmeted ruffianism 
that strode high-handed over the world. 

The enthusiasm of old times communicated itself from place to place, 
producing revolutions wherever it found a population numerous enough to 
dare to enter into the struggle with feudal power. The inhabitants of the 
towns which this political movement had gained met together in the church 
or market-place, and took oath, upon the holy things, to sustain one another, 
and thenceforth not to permit that any one of them should be wronged or 
treated as a serf. It was this oath, this conjuration (or swearing together) 
as it was called in ancient documents, which gave birth to the Commune. 
All those who were bound together in this manner took thence the name of 
sworn men, or jnen in Comimmion {'■'■jnrds''^ or '■'• Co?nmuniers^''\ and for 
them these new titles comprehended the ideas of duty, fidehty, and recipro- 
cal devotedness, expressed in antiquity by the word "citizen." . . . 



■ t'i ' fjj.w.J. ' ..-" ' . ' , ii. ' ^'VJ^>x'^,t)i,). 'laj iM.;,',it,fc ! r i! iHt'-.Mt^w . V',.w 




mmm 



The Paris Commune. 



23 



In the south of Gaul, where the old Roman cities existed in greater num- 
ber, and where, farther off from the centre of Germanic invasions and dom- 
ination, they had kept their population and their riches, the attempts at 
enfranchisement were, if not more energetic, at least more completely fortu- 
nate. It is there only that the enfranchised cities reached the plenitude of 
that repubhcan existence which was in some sort the ideal to which all the 
Communes aspired.* 

To this succeeded the establishment of one kingly power, 
bringing in the principle of centralization, necessary perhaps 
towards the unity of the nation, but crushing out the republi- 
can Communes. The democratic spirit which arose afterwards 
in opposition to the centralization of royalty was only reaction- 
ary, the assertion of anarchical individualism, not republican. 
Monarchy overthrown, at the close of the eighteenth century, 
democracy had logically but the choice between free-trade or 
Communism, — the two egotisms of employer and employed, in 
either case only the assertion of every individual's right of pow- 
er, the opposite pole of the individualism of monarchy, '48 and 
'5 1 showed us how extremes meet ; how, " the Republic " failing 
through aiming at egotistical interests only, the Empire could 
outbid the Republic in its appeal to the mere rights of the 
democracy. Empire is but the greediness of one man ; and if 
democracy be only the assemblage of so many greeds, why 
should they not come to terms 1 So universal suffrage pro- 
claimed the Emperor. And the republican must take a new 
departure. If he accept not the higher theory of duty, if his 
Republic be not the work of all for the good of all, growing out 
of an active and even self-sacrificing propagandism for the sake 
of all humanity, on what ground shall he build 1 He confines 
himself to a mere politic " republicanism,". which is only self-de- 
fense. After the defeat of '51, who shall wonder that men, 
whose belief had been in schemes only for the material advan- 
tage of individuals (only that, however generous and self-sacri- 
ficing the advocate), should stand at bay instead of beginning a 
new pursuit .-* Who shall blame them if they could not escape 
the fatality of their own logic } Men who had passed through 
the Communism of Cabet and the like may be pardoned if, even 

* Thierry, Letter xiii. 




mm. 



•"UnHMMIMtf* 




24 The Paris Connnune. 

in rejecting that, they still retained some little of the separatist 
spirit of earlier clays, confirmed also, it may be, by a natural feel- 
ing of reaction against the centralization which has been the 
curse of modern France, and which helped to throw her so 
entirely at the feet of the Decembrist. On the other hand, 
men feeling the insufficiency of merely political cnange caught 
perhaps too hastily at any clue to lead them from the labyrinth. 
I am not criticising the men. I am only recalling certain modes 
of thought, so endeavoring to find the causes and track the 
courses of events. 

In their exile, after the establishment of the Empire, Pyat 
and some others appear to have fallen back upon this idea of 
the older Commune. Recollect the vote, not once only, for the 
Emperor. Bear in mind the net-work of imperial centralization. 
What shall break through that .'' What shall stand against the 
mightily organized power of the Church, buttressing the Em- 
pire .'' Appeal to the nation, — to the voices of the ignorant 
peasant majority! Wait the triumph of ideas, — ideas are pro- 
scribed, and it is the Church that educates. Exile or the City 
of Refuge — there seems no other choice. Again the Empire 
passes, not overthrown, but falling through. There is again a 
chance. Even this despair shall give us ground. This war 
against the foreigner shall make a nation of us, and in some 
sort a republic, with room and time for development and the 
thought of further progress. And, lo ! the peasantry elects a 
monarchical Assembly that betrays us to the Prussians ; the 
army of the Church will bind us to the wheels of some new 
constitutional monarchy, — a new Louis Philippe, or Thiers, in 
place of Napoleon. As a Frenchman, I think I would have 
given my life unhesitatingly for the Commune. And yet — 

Outside of all individual or national difficulties, beyond all 
that may excuse or justify us as individuals or in the composite 
individuality of nationhood, stands the inexorable law of cause 
and effect, which will not spare us for any excuse, for even the 
most sufficient justification. The days of isolation and separat- 
ism are at an end, whether in Convents, Communes, or Com- 
munities, whether for Cities of Refuge or for Nations. The 
walls of China are falling, as those of Aries and Nimes and 




TJie Paris Commune. 



25 



Laon fell, not to be built up again. Our business, our hope, is 
no longer isolation, but association and devotion to humanity. 
The Christian theory of Right is a problem worked out and 
demonstrated. We have no new phase of it to learn. But we 
have to learn the new gospel of Communion, the Duty of fellow- 
ship'^ Not again the hermitage in which the world may be for- 
gotten ; not again the Commune of old time, jealously guarding' 
itself from the world, an armed sentinel, as inhumanly if not as 
tyrannously egotistical as the robber lord or more imperial bri- 
gand against whom it then was justified in keeping guard ; no 
longer the narrow national and inhuman policy of " avoiding 
entangling alliances." The hermit must quit his cell for active 
citizenship, the Commune labor_/(?r and ivith and under order of 
the nation, the nation own itself a citizen of the world. Each 
in its sphere, — citizen, Commune, or nation, — only the sworn 
soldier, or, if need be, martyr, of universal republicanism. This 
is the duty of the time: and in the misunderstanding of this 
lay the mistake of the Paris Commune, and the weakness which 
would have insured its failure, though the Red flag were float- 
ing now over the Hotel de Ville, not only in Paris, but in all the 
Communes of "republican" France. 

Again, I am not speaking against the men. Before the men 
who gave their lives so grandly I bow my head with reverence 
I would not owe to kings. I would rather be with Delescluse 
in that bloody Paris gutter than with the Kaiser in his triumphal 
car. Honor to the defeated Commune ! But let even the other 
cities of France remonstrate with Paris. Why did they not 
second her endeavor .-* Not altogether because of the lying cir- 
culars of Thiers ; not certainly for want of some sympathetic 
spontaneity. Lyons and Marseilles believed also in the Com- 
mune. Toulouse obeyed the impulse of the capital. But why 
should one Commune move with another .'' A federation of 
Communes may be a philosopher's dream ; but the policy is 
unsound. If your principle is isolation, separation, the federa- 
tion is as it pleases us, when it pleases us, or not at all. There 
lies the fatal error of any sectional policy. We are not going 
backward to secession and division, even with a federation as 
the end. The peoples have suffered enough to obtain even the 



Mi>-**MMpaW>«l^ 




26 The Paris Coniviunc. 

framework of nationality : suffered all the evils of kingship, 
obliged, for the sake of one great ruler in an age, to bear the 
tricks of ordinary monarchs who cut and carved the countries 
at their caprice, joining this to that without sense of fitness, and 
often in their wars sundering the little cohesion that wiser men 
ordained or better times allowed. Still, after much suffering, we 
are somehow stumbling into the framework of nationality, the 
first condition for the real organization of society. It is some- 
thing to have the form. Though the spirit of nationality which 
shall give us life and growth can only be breathed into us by 
the Republic. 

The Commune is a failure. The men who attempted it are 
condemned. The great humanitarian question set by these 
" Communists,", the question of the abolition of misery through 
the organization of labor, is not to be solved that way. Is the 
Reaction therefore sure 1 This wager of battle has given no 
verdict for or against the issue. It says no more than this : Not 
by a single city, nor by a separate nation, shall that remodeling 
of society be accomplished through which the hire of the laborer 
shall no longer be kept back by fraud. The weakness of the 
Paris Commune lay in its isolation. Yet all that blood has not 
been poured out in vain. One gain cannot escape us. While 
we note mistaken policy, let us not the less take this to heart : 
that once again these men of Paris have given to the world the 
ever-needed example of heroic daring and devotedness, have 
laid one more broad stone (though it be their own grave-stone) 
of that glorious causeway over which Humanity, defeated or tri- 
umphant, marches firmly to the Republic. 



• ;-i?r J'^ss^ai^s ^Kss^ssf 'w»;'*^":'s<B'^sryBi!t 



I 



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